


your heart in my hands, your song in my head

by La_Catrina



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: F/M, Force Bond (Star Wars), Post-Star Wars: The Last Jedi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-23
Updated: 2018-02-23
Packaged: 2019-03-18 04:49:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13674591
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/La_Catrina/pseuds/La_Catrina
Summary: "Where did you learn that song?"She feels Leia's Force signature wrap around her, immeasurable and warm.It's a desert hymn, Rey wants to say.Some paltry tune a lonely child made-up, to fill the emptiness and silence that gathered between the shifting dunes. Or a travelling song, heard in the dusty streets of Niima Outpost from equally dust-caked offworlders. But each one rings false."I know it," Leia says, gaze turning towards the viewport, the vast emptiness of space visible from behind the transparisteel. "It's an old Alderaanian lullaby. I haven't heard it in years."Clarity strikes; like lightning, like fate, like a memory of a vision she had forgotten.Ben.





	your heart in my hands, your song in my head

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Chthonia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chthonia/gifts).



> Thank you to all the mods of the Reylo Fanfiction Anthalogy for your time and energy in organizing this exchange! It's been a great experience, I really enjoyed myself. 
> 
> Based on the prompt: Rey is explaining the Force Bond to Finn and/or Leia when it activates.

The planet was damp, and cold, and dark.

 

Strong winds blow in from the oceans that cover the majority of Argazda, the cold slicing through even the sturdy poncho she’s brought from Ach-To. In the distance, white capped waves dash themselves against the cliffs that lead to their base, like great hulking beasts determined to escape from their watery prison.

 

Rey closes her eyes, remembering the tiny island she’d envisioned for so long in her dreams. Ach-To had been cold and wet as well, but the planet had teemed with life, and when the clouds parted the sunlight that filtered through had shone warm and clear on her face. But Rey won’t ever tire of rain, she’s sure of it -  as she’s sure a piece of Jakku will always remain within her, the desert sun scorched into her bones.

 

The storms on this planet are intense though, sheets of rain pelting the planet’s rocky surface as the winds howl and the oceans rage. The sky is in a perpetual grey haze, the sun blocked by dark clouds. The tempests keep the Resistance- what little of them remain- confined to their new base. They’re all still shell-shocked and wary from the events on Crait, but they’d been in desperate need of a new base of operations that wasn't the cockpit of the Millennium Falcon.

 

For weeks after Crait the electric blue lines of hyperspace had zoomed across the Falcon’s viewport, leaving the Resistance adrift in a sea of blue. The streams of light had shimmered before her, reflected in Rey’s eyes, beautiful and haunting. It had been a momentary distraction from the failures that lingered heavy in her mind. The undecipherable Jedi texts, the broken saber, and that last image of Ben; kneeling before her with something like regret falling across his face as she’d resolutely lifted the Falcon’s ramp.

 

And there was nowhere she could go to escape these thoughts, crammed as they all were in the the Millenium Falcon. Worse, she could feel the sharp intrigue of every resistance member who wasn’t Finn or Leia.

 

 _“Who are you?”_   they wondered,  _“Nowhere girl from a nowhere world, come to save us?”_

 

 _“I’m no one,”_  she wanted to scream.

 

She wanted, for one inconceivable moment, to be back on Jakku scavenging the wreckages of fallen Star Destroyers. The thought passed quickly, but the feeling remained, and Rey, who all her life had climbed the highest wreckages, crossed the deserts daily, chafed at the small confines of the Falcon and all the people it housed.

 

When news arrived that they’d be making planet fall Rey had felt something treacherously close to relief fill her. But that was before they’d landed on Argazda and its perpetual storms. The same claustrophobic feeling remained, for the base with its rocky walls and dark interior felt more like a prison than a reprieve.

 

So Rey lingered at the base’s entrance daily, for far longer than she cared to admit. The wind pulled her hair and lashed her eyes, and the rain stung with its ferocity, and yet they loosened something up inside of her she didn’t know needed to be freed.

 

But now a pair of thunder-heavy clouds appear near the horizon, and with one last searching look Rey turns back to the base.

 

* * *

 

Artificial light shines stark onto the weathered pages of the Jedi texts. Not even the extra illumination can keep the letters from blurring in her vision.

 

It had started yesterday, a low pounding in the back of her head that thumped along with the rhythm of her heartbeat. She’d tried to ignore it, drank more water than usual at breakfast, though she knew the feeling of a headache from dehydration and how this wasn’t it.

 

The base had always felt cool, the dark stone absorbing heat no matter how high they turned the ancient heaters they’d found stashed in some forgotten corner, but by mid-afternoon Rey felt absolutely chilled. Fine tremors racked her body, and the lengths of her arms were full of goosebumps. She gritted her teeth and soldiered on, continuing her work of gutting the engine of a _RZ-2 A-wing_ _Starfighter_ for any reusable parts and scrapping the rest.

 

But by dinner the tremors had extended to her hands, and the din from the dining area sounded deafening when she walked in. She searched for Finn in the crowd, desperate for a familiar face to ease the discomfort.

 

Not even Finn’s presence, normally so grounding, was enough once she’d found him yesterday.

 

“Rey, are you ok?” he asked, pressing a hand to the back of her forehead, his own scrunched up in worry once he’d seen her. Her eyes shone fever-bright, and angry red splotches painted her cheeks. The touch jolted her, still unused to having anyone reach out to her, to having people who care.

 

And yet.

 

The desert dweller still within her shrunk from it, longed to hide in some quite hole until the pain and weakness passed.

 

“I think- I think I need to go back to my room,” Rey had replied, even as she rested her forehead a moment longer against his warm palm.

 

“I really think you should take something for that,” he countered, but already she was leaning away, grabbing the leftover military ration pack from her tray and stumbling out of the dining hall. She’d given one last look at Finn and waved  goodbye weakly before the winding corridor that led to the barracks cut her off from view.

 

That had been last night, and she’d only made it part-way through the morning until she’d realized she’d rewired the astromech socket of a _T-70 X-wing_ completely wrong, vision swimming before her. But Rey was stubborn, and still that restless energy burned within her. She couldn’t do any mechanical work, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t do anything.

 

So the Jedi texts had lain before her for the past few hours, spines open but without revealing any knowledge. They remained as unreadable as ever, a language and way of writing so ancient it was difficult to make sense of anything, and the pages felt old between her fingers, as if one wrong touch would lead them to crumble.

 

 _“Is this really all that’s left of the Jedi Order?”_   she thinks, hunched over the books in question. A half dozen ancient texts, one non-functional lightsaber, and an untrained girl. The headache persists, filling her head with a dull heavy pain, and a fever simmers underneath it all. Rey closes her eyes, hoping for a few seconds of reprieve.

 

Between one moment and the next, the book slips through her fingers onto the durasteel floor, and she slips into unconsciousness.

 

* * *

 

The feeling of burning up jolts her back to awareness hours later. From across the room the chronometer’s numbers flash dimly, casting her room in a white glow. It’s sometime late, past midnight, though she can barely make out the time. Sweat lingers on her brow, pools beneath the dip of her collarbone and underneath the swell of her breasts. The fever had returned sometime during the night, and now her whole body aches, from what feels like the top of her hair to the soles of her feet.

 

Rey struggles to unearth herself from under the pile of blankets, feeling like she’ll suffocate otherwise.

 

She’s only felt like this once before, years ago. The exact memory of how she slipped from her roping gear is blurred, she only knows she was hanging on the side of an _Imperial_ -class Star Destroyer, meters above the ground – and then she wasn’t. The pain stands out clearer - she’d broken her arm from the fall.

 

She’d cried and cried, but there had been no one to help her, and so she’d dragged herself onto her speeder and somehow made it back to Niima Outpost. Unkar Plutt controlled the medical supplies in Niima, as he did everything else, and she’d had to haggle for a tiny bacta patch, knowing there was no other way. If she refused, she would have been dead within the week.

 

Three months of quarter portions for all her hauls, no matter the actual value. That was the trade she made, and she’d gotten the patch. But three days later an infection set in, and what little progress she had made slipped through her fingers. For two nights she burned with fever, staring up through the bolt hole of her AT-AT at the tiny pinpricks of stars that littered the night sky, like a thousand unseeing eyes, unaware of her pain.

 

And then, for a moment, there had been a warm hand on her cheek and the outline of a woman gazing down at her.

 

Her parents had returned, when she’d needed them the most. Sick and feverish, the relief blocked out the worst of the pain. It filled her with hope, though she couldn’t remember the color of her mother’s eyes or the shape of her father’s face. They’d _returned_ and that was all Rey had ever wanted. She fell asleep soon after, exhausted from her sickness.

 

But when the fever broke the following morning, there was no trace of them. It was as if they’d never been there at all. Rey awoke to her face pressed against her hand, her own palm cupped around her cheek. An empty, hollow feeling filled her chest, and in that moment it hurt more than the fall.

 

This is the memory she lingers on as the Force draws tight around her, like nerf-skin over a drum. Her head feels like it’s filled to the brim with sand, full and thick and Rey closes her eyes as another shiver wracks her body, unaware of what’s occurred.

 

“Rey,” she hears, that strangely soft voice echoing in her ears and in her room.

 

 _No_ , she thinks, _not you too._

 

She doesn’t want to see him. Something inside her tightens at the idea that he’s just a vision, another lie her mind has made up to comfort her. Rey doesn’t linger on why she would think to seek comfort in him at all – after everything.

 

His boots shuffle across the floor as he approaches her bed, and his breathing sounds closer now. “What’s wrong?” He demands, wanting to know why she’s half crazed from fever.

 

Rey turns her head into the crook of her elbow, refusing to open her eyes. She can pretend he’s real so long as she doesn’t actually look at him.

 

“Look at me, – please,” he says, and the loneliness in his voice undoes her, as it always does.

 

 _Ben_ , she thinks, as she blinks her eyes open and he comes into focus, crouched down only a few feet away from her. His long face is paler since she last saw him, and dark shadows like bruises linger under his eyes. But one other detail catches her attention; he’s not wearing any gloves. His large hands look strangely soft in the dim lighting of her room. She’s only seen his bare hands once before, on Ach-To, and her mind fixates on them, not quite comprehending.

 

Rey’s heart aches.

 

So he is a vision then, or some hallucination. Some trick her mind has conjured, Ben with no mask and no gloves, with that strangely open expression on his face.

 

“You’re not real,” she croaks.

 

His eyes narrow, “I’m as real as the Force allows.”

 

Ben’s gaze lingers on the flyaway hairs that surround her face, eyes shining nearly black in the dim light. His hands clench into fists, as if to prevent himself from reaching out. “You’re sick,” he says. “If you’d accepted my offer this would have never happened,” he sounds surly now, a muscle ticking underneath the skin of his jaw.

 

“You know why I couldn’t.”

 

“No I don’t. I would have given you _everything_ ,” he snarls, standing so quick her vision swims as she looks up at him. “I would have given you green worlds and stars and-” he pushes himself farther away, beginning to pace across the length of her room. The echo of his steps across the durasteel floor reverberate inside her skull.

 

“Don’t do that,” she asks.

 

He stills, and in the ensuing silence her pain subsides slightly.  “I never – I never asked for any of that,” she hears herself say, though her voice sounds far away to her own ears, like she’s somewhere miles and miles off. She wishes Ben would stop fighting, wishes he were real, and there, that he’d chosen differently that night on the _Supremacy._

 

“At least you wouldn’t be half delirious from a fever. At least you wouldn’t be alone,” he says, again in that soft voice. The corners of his lips tremble.

 

 _At least we wouldn’t be alone,_ is what he doesn’t say, though Rey hears the words all the same.

 

Her eyes slide away from his face, lowering until they rest on his clenched hands again. “I wanted to,” she confesses, fever sick and aching. She hears a sharp intake of breath. For one moment she’d looked at his offered hand and wondered what it would be like to accept. Ben inches closer, one step at a time, like a moon slipping into orbit around a sun.

 

“Why didn’t you?” he asks, lifting one pale hand towards her face, as if to touch her. His outstretched fingers hover just above her cheek, some final compulsion preventing him from closing that final distance.

 

She breathes in, out. “Because I couldn’t have lived with myself if I did.” Rey’s cheek rests sticky against her sweat damp pillow, but if she were to turn her head just so, she would feel the tips of Ben’s fingers grazing her. She feels him tense, and she doesn’t need the Force to know he’s hurt and already beginning to pull away.

 

So she bridges the gap, turning her head slightly towards him, and feels the barest glance of his fingers. The contact stands out in sharp relief even in her hazy mind, the softest of touches on her cheek, feather light. “But I wanted you to come. So badly, I wish you would have come with me,” and now she’s babbling, wanting so much for make Ben understand, even if he isn’t real. “I don’t – I don’t regret it. But I wanted it to be _different.”_

“That path is dead,” he replies. “There is only what is to come.” He curves his palm – shockingly cool – gently against the apple of her cheek. That hollow, lonely place inside of herself fades for a moment, not gone but… diminished, made lesser by Ben’s touch.

 

“You need to rest,” Ben says, and the cot dips slightly where he settles himself on the edge of it. “And in the morning you need to go to the medbay. Even your rebel scum doctors can treat this.” It doesn’t surprise her that fake Ben doesn’t know how to ask for anything any better than the real one.

 

“Can’t. Low supplies,” she manages to reply, but she’s tired now, so tired.

 

“Rey –”

 

“Stay.”

 

His eyes flit across her face, from one feature to the next, over and over as if trying to memorize them. “For as long as I’m able,” he says, even as her eyes slip closed. His hand slides up into her hair, pushing the sweat soaked strands away from her face. It feels nice, she realizes distantly, his fingers carding through her hair as his palm settles like a comforting weight against her head.

 

Ben begins to hum, a sound so low she can feel the vibrations in her chest. The melody is achingly soft and sweet, the lilting notes soothing as Rey begins to drift asleep. The last thing she hears are whispered words, and she dreams of moonlight, ethereal and beautiful, falling over her like a veil.

 

* * *

 

In the morning Rey’s fever breaks. The worst lies behind her, though she wakes up feeling like a rancor knocked her over. She’s heading to the medbay before she realizes it, her feet carrying her there seemingly of their own accord. Turning back crosses her mind, but in that moment Dr. Kalonia rounds a corner and spots her. All thoughts of retreat vanish.

 

Rey likes the older woman; her no nonsense attitude contrasted against her gentle touch. And she’ll always be grateful to the doctor for saving Finn’s life after Starkiller base.

 

“It’s a good thing you stopped by to see me. You look about ready to drop,” she remarks, hand steady while waving a medi-scanner over Rey’s body. Its tinny beeps fill the air as it checks her vitals.

 

“I wasn’t going to, actually. I’ve felt worse.”

 

Dr. Kalonia hums, as if contemplating this new piece of information and yet finding herself wholly unsurprised. “And what made you change your mind?”

 

Rey blinks, caught off guard. She’s not sure, exactly. She’d been so adamant about it yesterday, convinced it wasn’t serious enough to be checked. “I don’t know,” she replies.

 

“Lucky it was only a cold virus. A nasty one for sure, but manageable. I’m giving you a bacta shot to speed up your recovery.” Dr. Kalonia slides down one of her arm wraps and presses a small syringe against the uncovered skin. She hears a popping noise, and then a sharp sting follows.

 

“Anyways, –” she says, wiping away a splotch of blood, “– I’m glad you came to see me. Drink plenty of fluids, get some rest, well, as much as you can anyway, and hopefully I won’t see you in my office again for some time.” 

 

Rey nods, already sliding off the bench and heading towards the exit. “Thank you,” she says, grateful but distracted. A memory lingers just beneath the surface of her mind, the ghost of a gentle touch – before the communicator on her belt beeps.

 

_Repairs needed on X-wings in hangar 7-B._

Kriff! She’d completely forgotten she had a double mechanic shift today. And just like that the memory slips away, replaced instead with hyperdrive motivators and flux capacitors, and the realization she still feels like bantha fodder.

 

It’s going to be a long day.

 

* * *

 

Rey’s going stir crazy on base. A creature of open skies and endless deserts, the ever winding underground tunnels cage her in.

 

It’s one of those days when she bolts once her mechanic work is done, eager for at least a couple of seconds of reprieve outside. The wind claws her hair from her messy bun as soon as she slips outside, and the cold stings her cheeks raw.

 

A rocky outcrop exists some meters from the base’s entrance, tall enough to offer some semblance of reprieve from the biting wind. Rey spots a relatively flat boulder once she arrives. It’s not the most comfortable place to rest, with edges of rock digging into the soft meat of her thighs, but it’ll have to do.

 

Rey reaches a hand under her grey poncho to withdraw one of the Jedi texts from its hiding place. She’s made some leeway in deciphering the texts, but it’s extremely slow going. Languages have always come easily to her, but the books might as well have been written in code for all the sense she can make of them. This one explains something about refracting light and kybers, whatever those are.

 

She hopes the fresh air will clear her mind enough to get into a translating headspace.

 

Rey’s slogging through a confusing passage about the ethics of reciprocity, mouthing the words aloud, when she feels the Force bond come to life for the first time since the battle on Crait. The roar of the wind and the waves fades out of existence, and instead that strange humming fills her ears.

 

Ben sits across from her, dressed in flowing back robes that probably cost more than all the Starfighters they currently own combined. They’re clothes befitting his new station as Supreme Leader. Bile rises in her throat.

 

“We don’t require any more starship fleets stationed around the Core Worlds. I’ll send all of you the coordinates of the Mid-Rim planets I want to focus on.”

 

Rey can’t hear whatever his First Order lackeys respond, though she hears the annoyance in Ben’s tone when he snaps, “Are you questioning me? No? Then this meeting is over. Leave.”

 

She looks away. The events on the _Supremacy_ still sting like an open wound, though she’ll never tell him that.   

 

“I see you’re better than the last time I saw you.”

 

Rey doesn’t answer, staring instead at the book clenched between her hands.

 

“Don’t bother pretending like you can’t hear me, I know you can,” he says, after the moment stretches on and she refuses to acknowledge him.

 

Rey stares at the same page, rereading the same passage over and over again, unable to concentrate as Ben tires of waiting and rises from his seat to approach her. He catches sight of the book in her hands.

 

“So I see Skywalker finally found those books,” he sneers. “You won’t find what you need there. They’re nothing more than the useless ramblings of dead zealots. They’d serve you better as kindling, and you’d still need a teacher.”

 

His lasts words have her seeing red, and just like that she’s talking to him.

 

“How dare you!” she says, ripping her gaze away from the Jedi texts. “Do you hear yourself? Are you nerve-burned? That is the last thing I want from you, Ben,” she seethes, an indignant red flush crawling down her neck.

 

“That’s not what you said the last time we met,” Ben narrows his eyes, even as satisfaction glitters beneath them.

 

“What are you talking about?” Rey demands.

 

“You can’t lie to me Rey. I know you better than that.”

 

“I’m really not in the mood for games,” she says, making as if to stand up. Maybe if she just starts walking, he’ll follow her and knock straight into a wall in whatever enormous new flagship he’s stationed himself on.

 

“Neither am I,” he says, stepping in front of her. “Fine. You’ll know what I’m talking about eventually. But what I said about those texts is the truth. If you want useful knowledge you’d be better off with a holocron – even a Jedi one.”

 

Rey doesn’t have the slightest clue what he’s talking about. Not for the first time she realizes a canyon separates his knowledge of the Force from hers. Not that is ever seemed to stop her.

 

“They're datacrons that contain valuable information in holograph form. They've been used by both Sith and Jedi for millenia, and can only be opened using the Force,” he explains, after she fails to show any reaction to his offer.

 

“And I’m sure you know exactly where I can find these _holocrons_.”

 

“Some,” he shrugs. “A vast majority of them were confiscated and destroyed during the reign of the Empire. Few survived then, and even fewer remain today. But Snoke,” he spits out the name, “was fond of collecting relics.”

 

“No,” Rey says, shaking her head. “Something like that would never be cheap, and I’m not willing to trade it for anything you’d be interested in.”

 

“And what if I said it was a gift?” Ben replies, leaning closer to her. This close to him she can smell him, the woodsmoke of his aftershave and the unmistakable scent of recycled spaceship air.

 

“Enemies don’t give each other gifts,” Rey says.

 

“Is that what we are Rey?” he murmurs. “Because I don’t think,-”

 

“What you think is irrelevant. As long as you’re part of the First Order, we’re enemies. You’re telling me if I walked into any Order base I wouldn’t be arrested, or worse, on sight?”

 

“That’s exactly what I’m saying. No one would lay a finger on you,” Ben says, his dark eyes boring into her own.

 

“You could still join the Resistance.”

 

“You think your band of terrorists wouldn’t shoot me dead on site?” he sneers.  

 

“They’re not like that. They’re good people, and my friends. If nothing else, I wouldn’t let them,” she replies. She doesn’t let herself dwell on what she’s offering.

 

Ben stands silent in front of her, the corners of his full mouth turned down.

 

“You’ve told them of the bond then, if everything you say is true?”

 

Rey doesn’t want to lie, and instead looks Ben straight in the eyes, letting the silence speak for her.

 

“I thought as much. They’d turn on you the instant they found out.”

 

“That’s not true,” Rey insists, though she refuses to think of the look on Finn or Leia’s face if they ever knew.

 

“It doesn’t matter. You’ll never be my enemy,” Ben says, just as a gale whips Rey’s hair across her eyes, obscuring her vision. When she finally pulls the loose strands away Ben is gone, and she is alone again.

 

“Yes, I am,” she replies though the words taste false on her tongue.

 

* * *

 

Three months later Rey looks through the viewport of a _GR-75 transport shuttle_ as Argazda grows smaller and smaller beneath them. Just when it seemed like none of General Organa’s former allies would ever return their calls for help, a late night encrypted message had arrived at the base. One of the General’s old friends, from her days in the Rebellion. The message hadn’t promised much, just some supplies and temporary reprieve on their planet located in the Outer Rim, somewhere in the Bri’ahl sector.

 

It isn’t much, but it’s enough. Argazda had never seriously been considered as a long term base for operations. It had been a place to lick their wounds, though a voice in her head – one that reminds her of General Leia – insists it was a _tactical retreat._

 

Either way, it was time to leave, and Rey spares no second glances to the stormy planet they left behind. She continues on her way to the command center where she, Poe, Finn and other higher ranking Resistance members have been called to a strategy meeting. She hums under her breath as she walks along, something she’s gotten into the habit of doing lately. The lilting melody sounds foreign, though she can’t remember hearing it anywhere. It’s not from Jakku at least, the tone too sweet and soft. She wonders if there are lyrics to go with it, though none come to mind.

 

She’s almost to the control center when she comes across the General heading the same way. The sudden weight of Leia’s eye fall heavy on her, just as a ripple of emotion reverberates through the Force. It fades quickly, but still an echo remains – a flash of shock and grief.

 

“General! I was just on my way to the meeting,” Rey says, the last of her song notes lingering in the air.

 

“How many time must I ask you to call me Leia?” she replies, not unkindly. She doesn’t acknowledge the strange ripple from moments ago. Rey reached out with the Force, gentle, but bumps up against the older woman’s shields, strong and unbreakable as trimantium.

 

“Of course, Leia,” she says. Best to leave it be.

 

“Good. Now come on, if we leave Dameron alone for too long there’ll be another mutiny by the time we arrive.”

 

“You don’t really believe that.”

 

Leia snorts, “No. He’s been doing better since, –” her tone falters, “– since Crait. But he still has a lot to learn.”

 

Rey glances towards her, but Leia stares straight ahead as the two of them walk side by side.

 

Finn and Rose wave her over once they arrive. They’ve saved her a spot near the front of the room. Rey grins once she seems them; it’s only been a couple of months and already she has a soft spot for Rose. She only comes up to Rey’s shoulder, but she’s tough as durasteel nails and has a right hook to match. It’s been difficult for Rey to make friends after a lifetime of isolation on Jakku, but it’s not difficult with Rose. Finn’s eyes had glazed over when she’d tried to explain how to rewire a fault engine calcinatory, but Rose had gasped in understanding and joined in. Rey isn’t good with people, but fellow mechanics and machines – those she can do.

 

“Alright everybody,” Leia begins, moving to the forefront of the stage, “Senator Vish’aa has promised us shelter and supplies once we arrive on Lanteeb. We won’t have long there. Every day the shadow of the First Order reaches farther across the galaxy. Whatever time we have there will have to be enough.” Even without raising her voice every set of eyes is focused on her.

 

It’s amazing, how such a small woman can command an entire room. The years have not diminished the steel in the general’s spine, even after so many tragedies. It’s the same fiery will that had led a then teenage Princess Leia to lie straight to Darth Vader’s face.

 

_I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m a member of the Imperial Senate on a diplomatic mission to Alderaan._

Leia waits a moment, allowing the gathered Resistance members to absorb her words. “Once we arrive we’ll split into groups. Some of you to gather weapons and rations, some to gather intel, and others will go with me when I meet Senator Vish’aa. You’ll receive a holopad message later today with your assignment.”

 

Rose leans closer to Rey’s ear, “I hope I get to do the supply run. I’m better with machines anyway,” she whispers.

 

Rey nods in agreement, unwilling to speak in case they draw attention.

 

The rest of the meeting passes without incident, and soon enough they are all dismissed. Rey turns to leave with Finn and Rose, but her scavenger’s instincts warn her there’s someone staring at her. She looks around, but the only person left is the General, and her gaze is focused on a holopad held between her hands. A tired look settles on Leia’s face, but the control room doors slide close before she can get a longer look.

 

* * *

 

She’s undoing the lone bun in her hair later that evening when her datapad dings twice in quick succession, alerting her to new messages.

 

_Rey of Jakku: assignment sector 2A; negotiation rendezvous upon arrival of Lanteeb._

 

Another message rests just above the first.

 

_Rey, please meet me in my personal quarters at 0900 hours to further discuss your assignment._

_– Signed, General Leia Organa_

Rey’s stomach sinks. She’d hoped her assignment would involve more starships and less people. The chronometer on her screen signals she has half an hour before her meeting is scheduled. Just enough time for a quick sonic shower beforehand.

 

She knocks on the General’s door once she arrives, with five minutes to spare.

 

“You can come in,” a muffled voice replies.

 

Rey glances around the room as she enters, taking noting of the pile of datapads and flimsies that lay scattered across a small dining table. There’s a bed set along the far left corner next to what looks like the door to a private fresher. A tea kettle is heating over a portable stove set, but what really catches her attention is the viewport that runs along the majority of the back wall. Beyond it lies open space, and a million stars wink back at her.

 

Leia sits in at the dining table, still in her daytime clothes despite the late hour.

 

“You wanted to see me, General?”

 

Leia shoots her a pointed look, - “Sorry, Leia,”- and then gestures to the chair across from her. 

 

“Sit. I know it’s pretty late, but any earlier and we’d have half the crew barging in here for one reason or another.” The silver kettle starts to emit a shrill scream, and Leia reaches over to grab it. “Actually, we’ll probably –,” she pours boiling water into two small cups, “-still be interrupted at least once tonight.”

 

Rey leans forward, breathing in the steam rising from her little cup as a soft floral aroma engulfs her senses. 

 

“It’s Gatalentan tea, one of my favorites.”

 

“I’ve never had any kind of tea in my life before,” Rey says, the cup warm and comforting between her hands.

 

“Then I hope you enjoy your first taste,” Leia replies.

 

Rey blows lightly, allowing the tea to cool before taking a cautious sip. A mellow, sweet taste fills her mouth, and she hums in approval. A pleased smile lights up Leia’s face, before a more serious expression replaces it.

 

“I’d really like nothing more than to have invited you over for some tea, but the reality,-” Leia picks up a flimsy, “– is that I thought it best to discuss what our mission will look like once we land.”

 

“What did you have in mind?”

 

“Luke did more than save us, on Crait. He gave the galaxy something it desperately needed; hope.” It’s true, Rey thinks. It hadn’t taken long for news of Luke’s return to spread across the furthest reaches of the galaxy, despite the First Order’s best attempt to the contrary.

 

“My brother is gone,” Leia continues, “but you, Rey, you remain.  I was hoping that once we landed you’d accompany me on official business. The Jedi were once a symbol of hope for the galaxy, and I believe it’s important for people to see they remain,” she finishes.

 

Rey’s heart plummets at the words. Leia wants to take her along? Officially? Six months ago she’d still been scavenging Star Destroyers on Jakku, and now she was the last flame of the dying Jedi Order.

 

“But – I don’t even have a functioning lightsaber. And my only experience in politics back on Jakku was figuring out what the portion rates for the week were.”

 

Leia places a hand on her shoulder, warm and reassuring. “I know this is all new to you Rey. New people, new places, new responsibilities. It’s…overwhelming. But sometimes you have to look past the initial fear. You’re a great mechanic, but that’s not what the Resistance needs. It needs you.”

 

_Luke only taught me two lessons before I left Ach-To. I can’t get through the Jedi texts, though Force knows I’ve tried. I’m not even sure I know what being a true Jedi means._

Apprehension draws her shoulders tight with worry, gaze slipping past Leia to stare unseeing at the stars behind her.

 

“Rey, listen to me.” She finds her gaze drawn back to Leia, eyes alight with conviction. “You won’t be alone.”

 

The breath rushes out of her. Rey almost misses what the general says in lieu of the deafening roaring in her ears. The memory surfaces before she can suppress it; Ben that night in the hut, a nearly identical reassurance echoing from his lips. The moment they’d touched hands, and the vision of the future she’d seen. She wrestles with it a moment longer before banishing any trace of it from my mind.

 

“Don’t worry, I’ll be there every step of the way.”

 

Rey’s heartbeat slows, anxiety lessened by Leia’s reassurances. Acting as a symbol of the Rebellion still sounds daunting, but she trusts Leia knows what she’s asking of her.

 

“Alright,” Rey nods, “If it’s what you need me to do, I’ll do it.”

 

Across from her Leia stands up from her chair, a solemn expression on her face. “I know I ask a lot from you,” she says, crossing the room towards the viewport. “And from Finn and Poe and everyone else. I ask so much of all of you, but I wouldn’t ask if there were any other way,” she finishes.

 

Weariness rings heavy in her words, and Rey wonders how many people Leia has lost, how many soldiers she’s sent into battle who never returned. If she sees the ghosts of the Rebel Alliance in the faces of the Resistance. It’s a sobering thought, that this war must feel like the worst kind of déjà vu.

 

“Back on Jakku, there was no time to debate whether you could or couldn’t do something. Either you did it, or you died. The desert was unforgiving, like the First Order is unforgiving. We are in desperate need of allies and support. I’ll go with you on Lanteeb, and any other place you need me.”

 

“Thank you. You know, despite the circumstances under which we’ll be staying there, I think you’ll like Lanteeb. It’s not as green as Takodana, or D’Qar, but I’ve heard the spring blooms are quite a sight.”

 

Rey’s mood lightens at the thought. She remembers the spinebarrel flower she’d left behind in her AT-AT. She can’t wait to see how different the flowers on this planet might be.

 

“That sounds lovely. Is there anything else that needed to be discussed?” she asks.

 

Leia doesn’t answer right away, the silence between them stretching on. “There is one last thing I wanted to ask you,” she says finally. “This morning, in the hallway, I heard you humming.”

 

"Where did you learn that song?"

 

She feels Leia's Force signature wrap around her, immeasurable and warm.

 

 _It's a desert hymn_ , Rey wants to say.

 

Some paltry tune a lonely child made-up, to fill the emptiness and silence that gathered between the shifting dunes. Or a travelling song, heard in the dusty streets of Niima Outpost from equally dust-caked offworlders. But each one rings false.

 

"I know it," Leia says, gaze turning towards the viewport, the vast emptiness of space visible from behind the transparisteel. "It's an old Alderaanian lullaby. I haven't heard it in years."

 

Clarity strikes; like lightning, like fate, like a memory of a vision she had forgotten.

 

_Ben._

And like that the memories come rushing back, hazy from fever and exhaustion, but undeniably real. Ben, in her room, sitting on her cot and stroking her hair. Asking him to stay, confessing her fears, and her worries. His singing, last of all, the same melody that has haunted her ever since.

 

Rey’s fingers dig into her palms hard enough to leave behind the imprints of crescent moons. It had all been real, and she’d forgotten. Or hadn’t wanted to remember. Remembering meant she’d wanted his comfort even after everything. His words that afternoon on the cliff finally made sense. She'd poured over them more nights than she could count, wondering what he meant.

 

Leia continues, unaware of the turmoil brewing in the pit of Rey’s stomach.

 

“My mother used to sing it to me when I was a small child. The last time I heard it was just after the secret of my parentage was revealed to the entire galaxy. My parents – my _real_ parents – were Breha and Bail Organa, Queen and Viceroy of Alderaan. Their last gift to me was a keepsake chest with a message inside about the identity of my birth parents; Darth Vader and Padme Amidala, a former queen of Naboo. It also included a recording of that song, named _Mirrorbright.”_

 

The pain in Leia’s voice is apparent, a wound that has never fully healed.

 

“What happened?” She realizes Leia will be expecting an answer, but it takes all of her willpower not to run from the room.

 

“There was a young Centrist senator, –” something in Leia’s voice catches, and Rey knows whoever she’s talking about is no longer alive, “-who was my friend. Vader and the Empire enslaved his planet and worked his people to death. Someone else found my keepsake box, which until then had been hidden from me, and gave it to him. His fear and sense of betrayal at finding I was descended from the monster who had caused him so much pain overshadowed everything else. He played the recorded message in front of the entire Senate. I lost most of the support and trust I’d been building my entire political career.”

 

So Leia had been betrayed, and by a friend no less.

 

In that second, Rey realizes she has a choice. She could lie to Leia, tell her anything else but that her son had sung that lullaby as she lay in bed, sick from a cold. Or she could tell the truth, all of it, and lay bare everything that has happened since the Force Bond flared to life.  Fear paralyzes her, she’s frightened of what Leia will say if she knows that the Supreme Leader of the First Order has a direct link to her mind.

 

Some other part of her, secret and ashamed, doesn’t want to tell the general, because for all it had caused her pain, the bond is _hers._ In her short life, Rey has owned so very little things that truly belonged to her. Her speeder, her old Rebellion helmet, her AT-AT, and even all of those had been scavenged and repurposed until they fit her needs.

 

But she isn’t just a scavenger anymore. And if she lies, now, and somehow Ben uses the link to hurt the Resistance, she’d be no better than that senator. Ben had warned her that the Resistance would turn on her if they knew. Determination fills her. She's proved him wrong before.

 

So she makes a choice.

 

Rey takes a deep breath. “I wasn’t completely honest, about the battle on Crait. I was on the _Supremacy_ that day.”

 

Leia turns around to look at her, open space against her back.

 

“It started on Ach-To. I saw Kylo Ren, through the Force, as if he were really in front of me.”

 

Leia stills at the mention of her son, gaze unreadable as Rey continues her story. She tries to tell her everything; the reason for Ben’s final push into darkness – though she doesn’t elaborate on the exact nature of Luke’s betrayal – her vision when she touched Ben’s hand, of going to the _Supremacy_.

 

“There was still good in him, I knew it, and I thought,” Rey’s voice shakes from emotion, the memories of her failures bubbling up to meet her after months of suppression, “I thought that Ben Solo could turn back to the Light. That I could help him come back.”

 

She blinks back tears, “He _saved me_ , Leia, from Snoke. We fought side by side, but when it was over, and I asked him to spare the Resistance – ,”

 

The world draws tight around her, the sound in the room muffled all of a sudden, as if she’s underwater.

 

Panic fills her _. No, not now, not after so much time and not here._

She tries to close the connection as it flares to life, but the Force slips though her fingers like so many grains of sand. Rey blinks her eyes, and from one second to the next Ben appears, his back to her while he speaks to someone else.

 

“But he refused,” she says, focusing on Leia again, who has gone deathly still. The enormity of what she’s confessed lies heavy between them.

 

“What else can he see through the bond?” she asks at last.

 

“Nothing. Just me,” Rey answers. From the corner of her eye she sees Ben face her, finished speaking with the unknown person.

 

“Rey”, Ben says, with something like relief filling his words.

 

“You still call him that name, even after everything?” Leia asks, and Rey nods. She doesn’t think he’ll ever be Kylo Ren to her again.

 

“Who are you talking to, I wonder?” Ben asks, walking closer to her. “Which of your rebel scum friends has your attention?”

 

Rey refuses to acknowledge him, but stares in dawning horror as he walks into her field of vision, stepping just to the left of General Leia. If he were really there he’d be close enough to touch her. Rey’s always known he’s tall, but he completely dwarfs Leia, several heads taller than his mother. The scene before her is a painful simulacrum of what she’d hoped to see. She had imagined Ben in the beige clothes of the Resistance, not the ornate black robes he wears now. The exhaustion in Leia’s eyes would have been replaces with light at knowing her son had finally come home.

 

Rey is wrenched from her thoughts by Leia’s next question, “He’s here, isn’t he?” Rey nods, unwilling to speak. A shaky breath leaves Leia, and she gazes around the room, searching, as if she’ll be able to see him if only she looks hard enough.

 

“You’re still running, aren’t you? It doesn’t matter, there’s no corner of the galaxy you can hide where I won’t find you,” he says.

 

Starlight filters in though the viewport, lighting up the strands of silver in Leia’s hair. Ben seems to absorb it, the darkness surrounding him blacker in contrast. Rey doesn’t answer. Instead she looks at Leia, unsure on how to proceed.

 

“You can let him know I’m here,” General Leia says, nodding slightly.

 

"So you knew all along then, that the bond opened when I was sick. And you didn't say anything," Rey says, finally looking him in the eyes. 

 

"There were more important topics to discuss at the moment. I knew you would remember."

 

“I thought you were a hallucination, that you weren't real. How-"

 

"And yet all I did was talk to you, didn't I? I never once asked about where you were hiding or how to find you."

 

"That's not the point. But you don’t scare me anymore Ben, just as you’ve never scared your mother,” Rey says.

 

Ben’s face, already pale from lack of sun, pales further, leaving him wraithlike.

 

“Is she there with you? That’s not possible. I didn’t feel m- Organa though the Force after the command bridge of the _Raddus_ was decimated,” he says, as if trying to convince himself it's true.

 

“You shot down your mother’s ship?!” Rey feels her stomach clench in knots, horrified at the knowledge that Ben had tried to kill Leia.

 

His whole body goes taut, muscles clenching as he balls his hands into fists and grits his teeth. He seems to be wrestling with himself, although over what Rey doesn’t know.

 

“I didn’t pull the trigger, in the end,” he growls, beginning to prowl back and forth. “Snoke punished me for what happened on Starkiller Base, and even after that I couldn’t do it.”

 

“So you didn’t pull the trigger on the _Raddus_ , but you might as well have!”

 

Leia gasps, and when Rey turns toward her, some unreadable emotion reflects in her dark eyes. Ben’s eyes, Rey realizes belatedly, now that she has them both in front of her.

 

“Rey, I need you to tell him something,” she asks. “That I’m sorry for never telling him about Vader,  that I shouldn't have sent him away. That's when I lost him."

 

Tears well up in Rey’s eyes at the regret in Leia’s voice, the weight of so many mistakes and misunderstandings hanging heavy in the air. But through it all shines an undercurrent of love, stronger than durasteel, and as everlasting as vanadium.

 

“Your mother,” she says.

 

Ben flinches. “You told her about the bond? About us?” he says, hurt warring with an equal measure of accusation in his tone.

 

Rey fights the ludicrous urge to apologize. “There is no us,” Rey informs him instead, lips set in a grim line, before softening moments later. “Ben, Leia says she’s sorry for everything, for Vader-”

 

“I have no mother!” he snarls, and his saber screeches to life, painting the room in a sickly red pallor. “Don’t mention that woman ever again.”

 

Rey feels Leia eyes rove back and forth between her and what is nothing more than empty air to general Leia.

 

“Even after everything, I’ll never stop loving him,” Leia says as she closes her eyes. She inhales deeply, letting her lungs fill with air, and then lets it out slowly. “I forgive him, please tell him that.”

 

“She lo,-”

 

“Don’t say another word,” he warns.

 

Rey ignores him, forging on, “Your mother loves you, and she says she forgives you,” she says, the words reverberating in the Force, ringing with truth.

 

A choked sound escapes Ben’s mouth; a small, wounded thing, barely audible. The urge to reach out to him fills her, but Rey blinks her eyes, and when she opens them again he’s gone. The red pallor fades from the room, and then it’s just Leia and her again, alone amongst the stars.

 

“It was him, wasn’t it, that showed you _Mirrorbright?_ ”

 

Rey nods, “I was sick from fever and I thought- I thought he was a dream. When I woke up I didn’t remember any of it. But I shouldn’t have let it get this-“

 

“Rey, stop,” Leia comes closer. “Thank you, for your bravery, for your strength. You showed my son compassion when by all rights you should have hated him. Don’t ever let anyone tell you that’s a weakness.”

 

Leia bends down, chin resting on the top of Rey’s head as her arms wrap around her. She smells like flowers, like the tea they’d just drunk. Rey wonders if this is what a mother’s touch feels like.

 

“I thought I’d lost my son to the Dark side, but I used to sing that lullaby to him when he was sick. The Dark is incapable of true compassion, of knowing someone’s pain and trying to lessen it for no other reason than you are willing and you can. Thank you, Rey, for giving me hope again.”

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed it Cthonia! 
> 
> Special shout out to the novel Bloodline by Claudia Gray. A lot of the Leia bits are referenced directly from that book, namely her love of Gatalentan tea, her keepsake chest, and most importantly, the Mirrorbright lullaby. 
> 
> Comments and constructive criticims are always welcome!


End file.
